kenshinfandomcom-20200223-history
Yukishiro Tomoe
Yukishiro Tomoe was the daughter of a low-ranking samurai family that remained on the side of the Bakufu during the bakumatsu and was engaged to her childhood friend Kiyosato Akira. However, when Akira was slain by the Hitokiri Himura Battōsai, Tomoe leaves home and joins the Yaminobu in order to avenge her fiancé. However, after tracking Battōsai down, she slowly falls in love with him instead. As the Yaminobu close their net around Himura, Tomoe intervenes and, saving her new husband's life, becomes a casualty herself - cut down by Himura's own sword. As such, Tomoe becomes Himura's primary motivation in his oath never to take another life as well as the motivation for her younger brother Enishi's revenge. Appearance Tomoe was a beautiful young woman with jet-black hair and eyes. She is thin and wears a white kimono with a purple shawl. She is constantly seen with a serene, almost sad look on her face, and rarely sports an expression of high emotion (for instance, happiness, anger, etc.). Personality The initial image of Tomoe as she is introduced into the series is blank and quite apathetic. This could be due to the death of her fiance, Kiyosato Akira, who is killed before Tomoe appears in Kenshin's flashback. She says that she's always had trouble expressing herself, not even smiling when Kiyosato proposed to her despite her joy. As such, she partially blames herself for his death. Though when interacting with her brother, Yukishiro Enishi, she becomes affectionate and shows more of her emotional side. After spending time with Kenshin, Tomoe begins to open up to him and even cries in his arms after confessing how she had tried to hate Kenshin for the murder of Akira. After Kenshin promises to protect the happiness that he has given her, Tomoe smiles at him. "This man stole my happiness from me...and gave me a new happiness. Farewell... my second love..." These are her parting words to Kenshin. Relationships * Himura Kenshin :Kenshin was the one who killed her fiancee. In order to to get revenge, Tomoe marries him, acting as a spy for the Shogunate, but she starts to develop feelings, which she keeps a secret by writing in her diary. After she dies protecting Kenshin, the latter learns the truth and filled with sorrow, he vows never to kill again once the revolution is complete and to atone for all his sins. She appeared in his dream, where she smiled for Kenshin after he smiled and told the latter that the Tomoe inside of Enishi stopped smiling for him. :It is clear that Kenshin loved her very deeply, as the guilt he felt for her death is what kept him from ever killing again following the Bakumatsu. This grief extended to the point where he couldn't face going to her grave until ten years following her death. Suffice it to say as Kenshin's first love, Tomoe was arguably one of the most influential people in Kenshin's life. *'Yukishiro Enishi' :He is her younger brother by roughly nine years. Tomoe became a mother-figure to Enishi as their mother died shortly after giving birth to Enishi and became very dear to him as a result. Despite appearing emotionless around most people, she seemed to allow herself to become more expressive around her brother. Tomoe seemed to love her brother dearly, however, she noted that he was a very emotional boy and could sometimes be a problem. After her death, Enishi lost all sense of himself and had only one thing in his heart: to get revenge on Kenshin. Only after reading Tomoe's dairy, which was given to him by Kaoru, did Enishi realize Tomoe's true feelings for Kenshin. For better or worse, she was an extremely influential person in Enishi's life and seemed to be the only person he ever properly cared about. *'Kiyosato Akira' :Akira was Tomoe's childhood sweetheart and fiancee whom she was going to marry before the former was killed by Kenshin. Category:Characters Category:Female Category:Deceased History Tomoe is the first child of a samurai as well as a low-level bureaucrat who served the Tokugawa Shogunate in Edo. Her mother died giving birth to her brother Enishi which left Tomoe to become a surrogate parent to her brother and he came to love her as both a sister and a mother figure. Tomoe met Kiyosato Akira, the second son of another similarly-ranked family as a child. They became childhood sweethearts and planned to get married which Enishi disliked at first but grew to accept it. Her happiness was short-lived as Kiyosato was killed by Himura Kenshin. She later met Kenshin after he killed an assassin sent to kill him. She fainted and Kenshin took her with him. As time went on, Kenshin started to develop feelings for her and they eventually married with Kenshin fifteen at the time and Tomoe eighteen. This was revealed to be a ruse as Tomoe was originally a spy to find Kenshin's weakness. Over time, she saw a more gentle side of him and abandoned her mission, having fallen in love with him. Eventually, her younger brother Enishi arrived informing her that the trap for Battousai was ready; after teling her brother to go home to not be involved with her dirty work, she confronts Tatsumi and the rest of the Yaminobu. It is revealed that her superiors intended for them to fall in love so they could make a weakness in Kenshin and take advantage of his love for her. They nearly succeeded in killing Kenshin after several attempts to. The final battle resulted in the leader and Kenshin charging at each other. Tomoe however, got in the way and stopped the leader from landing the killing blow on Kenshin, enabling him to kill the leader but her as well. Before dying, she gave Kenshin the second half of his signature cross-shape scar, the first having been given to Kenshin by her fiance. Her death was also witnessed by Enishi, whose hair and eyes turned white and turquoise respectively due to the extreme shock and emotional pain witnessing her death put him through. Fifteen years later, during Enishi's Jinchū, her image is very often seen by both her brother and Kenshin. To Enishi, she smiles to him at first, which gives him the strength and confidence to defeat his worst enemy. Meanwhile, Kenshin did not see her smile, as he lacked the answer to atone for his crimes and was overwhelmed by the consciousness of sin. However, the Tomoe that lived within Enishi eventually stopped smiling for him, and the one that lived within Kenshin did eventually smile, asking him to take care of her little brother for she was probably no longer smiling at him. This proved crucial in his defeat by Kenshin's hand. In the Live-action films She appeared during a flashback where she broke down and wept at Akira's body though her face is never shown. This leaves a possibilty of her appearing in a possible prequel. Kenshin later mentioned to Megumi that the cross-shaped scar on his face was given to him by a young samurai (Akira) and his fiance (Tomoe). Her appearance is noted by white plum petals, a nod to her perfume in the original story. Development and Reception Watsuki has stated that Tomoe's appearance and personality were modeled after Rei Ayanami from "Neon Genesis Evangelion", and that his intention for designing Tomoe to have her as a "cool beauty", aka. someone who never reveals her true motives or feelings. He stated that he liked the character and would like to use her again in a later work. Gallery MangaTomoeAppearsToEnishiWithoutASmileForTheFirstTime.png|Tomoe in the Manga series, an image in her younger brother Yukishiro Enishi's head. MangaTomoe5.png MangaTomoe4.png|Tomoe, deeply disheartened at the murder of her fiance, Kiyosato Akira. MangaEnishiAndTomoe.png|Tomoe and her younger brother, Yukishiro Enishi, in Kenshin's hallucination. MangaKenshinAndTomoe.png|Tomoe and Himura Kenshin. MangaTomoeSeesKenshinKill.png|Tomoe sees Kenshin murder. MangaKenshinAndTomoe3.png|Kenshin gives Tomoe shelter at an inn. MangaKenshinAndTomoe4.png MangaKenshinAndTomoe5.png|Tomoe and Kenshin, now husband and wife. Tomoe_introduced_her_brother_to_Kenshin.jpg|Tomoe introduced her brother to Kenshin Tomoe_and_Enishi.jpg|Tomoe and Enishi MangaKenshinAndTomoe6.png|Tomoe's new happiness, in her life with Kenshin. MangaKenshinAccidentallyStrikesTomoe.png|Kenshin mistakingly strikes Tomoe, in trying to protect her. MangaTomoeDiesInKenshinsArms.png|Tomoe's final moments, in Kenshin's arms. MangaTomoeDies.png|Tomoe dies. MangaTomoeDyingInKenshinsArms.png|Kenshin and dead Tomoe MangaTomoeDiesInKenshinsArms2.png|Kenshin, grief-stricken at Tomoe's death. MangaKenshinVisitsTomoesGrave2.png|Kenshin brings flowers to Tomoe's grave for the first time. MangaEnishiVisitsTomoesGrave.png|Enishi visits his sister Tomoe's grave. MangaKenshinAndKaoruAtTomoesGrave.png|Kenshin and Kamiya Kaoru visit Tomoe's grave. Tomoe_introduced_her_brother_to_Kenshin_in_Trust_&_Betrayal_OVA.jpg|Tomoe introduced her brother to Kenshin in Trust & Betrayal OVA. Tomoe_and_Enishi_in_Trust_&_Betrayal_OVA.jpg|Tomoe and Enishi in Trust & Betrayal OVA. Tomoe_and_sad_Enishi_in_Trust_&_Betrayal_OVA.jpg|In Trust & Betrayal OVA. Love's_night_of_Tomoe_and_Kenshin_in_Trust_&_Betrayal_OVA.jpg|Love's night of Tomoe and Kenshin in Trust & Betrayal OVA. Tomoe_watch.jpg|Sad Tomoe in Trust & Betrayal OVA. Tomoe_and_Kenshin_in_Reflections_OVA.jpg|Tomoe and Kenshin in Reflections OVA. Tomoe_and_Enishi_in_Reflections_OVA.jpg|Tomoe and Enishi in Reflections OVA. Tomoe_live_action.jpg|Tomoe breaks down and cries over Akira's body in the film. Trivia * In the sixth ending of the anime, 1/3 Junjou na Kanjou, Tomoe appears in two scenes. *Tomoe meaning 'Friend and blessing' * Due to a translation error, the warrior Kenshin killed alongside Tomoe was said to be her father in the English dub of Samurai X Trust and Betrayal. In the manga, her father was an old man who helped Kenshin get back on his feet after Karou's "death". Category:Characters Category:Female Category:Deceased Category:Yukishiro family Category:Bakufu